


The Winding Road to Moriyama's Man Cave

by StormySteady



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Frustration, Kasamatsu has lots of feels, M/M, Neither porn nor plot?, Pining, Walking around aimlessly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-05
Updated: 2014-10-05
Packaged: 2018-02-19 22:47:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2405693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormySteady/pseuds/StormySteady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All Kasamatsu wanted to do was go play basketball with his former teammates- and if Kise decided to walk over with him, whatever, that was fine. It wasn't as if the blond could slow him down that much, right?</p><p>A story in which buses are missed, ducks are fed, and Kasamatsu finally starts to figure out where he fits in Kise’s world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Winding Road to Moriyama's Man Cave

Six more pushups and he could stop for the day, Kasamatsu promised himself. Or at least, six more pushups and he could stop with the pushups. He still needed to do the rest of his exercises, all of his squats and weight stuff and maybe jogging a mile or four if the heat outside broke… but the pushups, at least, the pushups would be done.

He lowered his body towards the ground and carefully pressed it back up, arms shaking and exhausted from dozens of repetitions of the same. He exhaled and inhaled again. Just five more, now. 

The first time his phone beeped, he ignored it as usual. It was just a text anyhow, he could tell from the ringtone. Whatever it was, it could wait until he was done exercising. 

When it beeped for a second time, however, and then a third, and a forth, Kasamatsu started to pay it more attention. Not because he had any intention of picking it up, but because at that point it had distracted him enough to make him forget his count. Were there five reps left to go at this point, or four? Grimacing at his own lack of focus, Kasamatsu decided to split the difference and make it ten.

He finished the set and, after an appropriately long recovery period spent laying on his bedroom rug and panting, went to grudgingly pick up his phone. It looked like he’d gotten one text from Moriyama and then about half a dozen from Kise- he decided to get Kise’s out of the way first.

_“Captain!!!!”_ was all the first one read, followed by a cryptic _“(/^▽^)/ ****”._ And then “ _you just got that group text from Moriyama-senpai, right~?”_ before finally getting to the point with an inquisitive “ _what do you think, are you gonna go? I’ll go if you do~~”_

Kasamatsu sighed. He supposed he would have to respond to Kise, since he’d asked him a direct question. And he supposed that in order to do that, he would have to read the original proposition. Bracing himself for another classic Moriyama text (everyone on Kaijo’s team knew the type by then; it was the kind filled with sophomoric sexual innuendos and numerous references to “ladiezz”), he clicked back on his phone.

To his relief, however, there didn’t seem to be any references to the fairer sex at all. _“I’m bored. Summertime blows,”_ it read, simply. _“Any of you wanna come shoot some hoops? We can hang out in my man cave afterwards, my cousin just lent me a shit ton of old video games.”_

Kobori had already responded with a resounding _“sounds good, meet in an hour at your place?”,_ which prompted Kasamatsu to look at the list of recipients. There seemed to be only three: himself, Kise, and Kobori. 

_“Do you really want to take the risk of not inviting Hayakawa, after what happened last time?”_ Kasamatsu typed, buying himself a little time to consider Moriyama’s offer. It was true that he hadn’t played much basketball since his graduation, and that he was itching to get onto the court again. But on the other hand, it looked like Kise was thinking of going also, and if Kise was going, that might be a little, well...

Kasamatsu didn't quite know how to finish that thought. It wasn't as if things had gotten _weird_ between him and Kise, per se. They hadn't seen each other much since the beginning of the break, but because basketball season was long since over, there was nothing unusual about that. Even in their separation the blond continued to bombard him with inane texts at all hours, asking him how his day was going and sending him pictures of humorous little scenes he encountered while out and about. And on the rare occasions when they did get together- never alone, always with at least a few other members of Kaijou's team- their dynamic was much the same as it always had been. Kise would act out, Kasamatsu would reel him back in, and the pair of them together would unfailingly defeat all comers on the basketball court. Maybe Kise was acting little more clingy than normal, but that was to be expected- all of the other recent graduates were receiving the same treatment as well. It didn’t take a genius to realize that Kise wasn't a fan of goodbyes.

But even if it didn't _seem_ like things had changed between them, Kasamatsu knew that somehow, in some weird and probably unilateral way, they really had. Because since when had he started spending so much time and energy stressing out about his relationships with _freshmen_?

Part of it, he blamed on basketball, which seemed inevitable in a way. At the very beginning of that year’s season, Kasamatsu had caught himself paying a little too much attention to their newly-acquired ace, admiring him, it was possible, for traits that had nothing to do with his basketball prowess. Just vague things, like how graceful he looked while weaving across the court, and how he stayed late to practice more nights than anybody other than Kasamatsu himself, and the way his muscles had stood out, glistening, that one time that Kasamatsu had accidentally walked in on him in the shower. (Well, the last one wasn’t so vague.) But back then, Kasamatsu had still been new to his role as captain, and he had been incredibly fired up about the idea of needing to put the team ahead of his own personal desires. So, for the sake of the team, he had _kept_ his thoughts vague. He had put on the brakes on whatever idle daydreams he may have been having, hard. 

But ever since the Winter Cup had ended and, along with it, his high school basketball career, there had been no need to hide his feelings from himself anymore. And once he opened the door to them again, he was surprised to find that his puppy love had grown into a much larger beast. Something with teeth, that could actually hurt him if he wasn't careful. 

Because really, Kasamatsu knew perfectly well that wasting his time this way. That Kise was out of his league, that he would never give him a second glance. And so he could never understand why he kept on hoping. 

Moriyama's reply jerked him out of his spiral of self-pity. _"Oh, come on, you have to admit that was pretty funny. Looking back on it, at least."_

Even after all this time, Kasamatsu failed to see what had been so funny about publicly embarrassing themselves after a series of events involving the four of them getting slightly over-caffeinated at a pre-game-day hang-out session, completely overhauling their playbook, and forgetting to advise the fifth starter of the changes before a critical qualifying match for the Winter Cup. Maybe this was why Kise always said he had no sense of humor. Which was a little ironic coming from _him_ , because

Kasamatsu shook his head. Maybe if he shook it hard enough, the motion could dislodge all those stupid and irrelevant yellow-colored thoughts from his brain.

_"And remember, we did still win that game. Just, you know. Barely. But it's not even basketball season anymore!"_

Kasamatsu was tired of texting. His phone was of the decade-old brick variety, and typing out even a single sentence took _forever_. Kise kept telling him to get a new one so that Kasamatsu could send him pictures or whatever, but

He refused to finish that thought as well. _"Whatever. I’m not captain anymore, so I don’t care. I’ll be there in an hour."_

_"Me too!!!"_ came Kise's immediate reply via the group text. And then, in their own personal thread, _"We should walk together! You remember where my apartment is, yeah? it's right on your way to the school."_

Kasamatsu remembered where Kise's apartment was. He had walked past it at least once a week for an entire school year, occasionally even side-by-side with a certain ditzy blond who would, without fail, say something along the lines of "see you later, captain, this is my apartment!" or  "Hey captain, guess which apartment is mine?" or even compose stupid little songs like "unit eight-b is home to meee~... this is my apartment, by the way." He had broken into it once when Kise had overslept and nearly missed the bus to an away game (well, broken in, gotten Kise's younger sister to open the door for him, whichever), and, for one harrowing week during the wintertime, he had even possessed a spare key to it after having promised to come in and water the plants while Kise and his family were off on a ski trip. 

So yes, he remembered where the apartment was. Leave it to Kise not to remember all that, though.

" _Yeah, I know. I'll see you in ten._ ”

\--

 

Nine minutes and fifty seconds later, Kasamatsu arrived at Kise's door, holding  a basketball under his arm and dressed in his most heavy-duty knee socks. It had been a while since he had played basketball, and he was ready to go _hard_ , Kise or no Kise. Complex, treacherous feelings or no complex, treacherous feelings. However, it seemed like Kise had other priorities right then.

The blond's inability to open the door for Kasamatsu should have been his first clue. His initial ring of the bell had been met with nothing more formal than a muffled "Come on in, it's unlocked!" After entering, Kasamatsu had hovered in the entryway, unsure whether he would be staying long enough to justify taking off his shoes. Kise was nowhere to be seen, but, since he was close enough that his yell had been audible through the door, Kasamatsu decided that he must be just around the corner in their combined kitchen and living room. 

The words that Kise spoke next lent further credence to this theory. "I'm in the living room! It'll be a few minutes before I'm ready, so feel free to raid my fridge in the meantime if you want."

Kasamatsu sighed. Nothing Kise did took "just a few minutes". Stretching before practice? "Just a few minutes." When he was ready half an hour later, Kasamatsu was already cool. Getting lunch from the cafeteria? "Just a few minutes." By the time Kise was through the line, the bell had already rung. And it would be unwise to even get Kasamatsu _started_ on how long it took him to get ready for school.

It was a good thing that he wouldn't have to deal with any of these little frustrations anymore, Kasamatsu supposed, now that he had graduated. Although, thinking about good things normally didn't make his chest twinge so painfully.

Kasamatsu took off his shoes and padded towards the kitchen, wondering whether Kise's mom had gotten those weird little pears that he liked so much again. Finding one in a bag inside the fridge, he took it out, rinsed it, and started to munch. Then, he made his way back to the sitting area to find Kise. 

Or, as it were, Kise and his little sister. Kise, his little sister, and at least a dozen tiny colorful rubber bands, which his teammate was working into the elementary schooler's gold hair in an intricate braided pattern. 

Kasamatsu considered asking Kise what exactly he thought he was doing, and why, but that seemed obvious enough. Kise was all dressed up and ready for basketball and his sports bag was slumped next to him on the floor. His little sister must have waylaid him while he was en route from his room to the door. There was no use asking _what_ had happened. And so Kasamatsu contented himself with crossing his arms (making sure that pear juice didn't dribble into his elbow) and giving Kise a disapproving look. "Just a few minutes, huh?"

"Hello Kasamatsucchi!" Kise's little sister said, as she struggled to balance waving enthusiastically with staying still enough not to yank her half-formed braids from her brother’s grip. “Did you miss me? I haven’t seen you in _forever_.”

Kasamatsu scowled at her. It was hard enough to deal with that difficult big brother of hers; he had no patience for even more airheaded-ness and… cuteness and friendliness and other Kise-family characteristics in his life. "I saw you two weeks ago, it hasn't been _forever_. And haven’t I told you to stop it with the ‘-chi’ thing? Even your brother doesn’t call me that.” 

The girl met his bluster with a warm smile. “Well, maybe not to your face.”

These Kises were going to kill him, he swore. Shooting the elder a glare that would dice onions, he contemplated his escape. ”How long is this going to take? I told Moriyama we'd be there in an hour, you know, and his place is across town.”

"It'll be fine," Kise said blithely, twisting another lock of his sister's hair into the design and securing it with a pink hair tie. "We'll definitely get there in time. And even if we're late, what's Moriyama gonna do? Make us run laps? Hey, Kana, did I ever tell you-" he began, looking down at the top of his sister's head, a fond smile on his face, “-So you remember that _this_ guy here is the captain of my basketball team, right? Sometimes, he used to make me run all the way around the school grounds like ten times every day! And then if I didn't run fast enough, he would follow behind me and kick me. It was so harsh!" 

He laughed, and his little sister, taking her cue from him, laughed too. "I thought you said Kasamatsucchi was a nice person! That doesn't sound nice at all."

"I can be nice," Kasamatsu said, scowling at the Kise siblings' smiles. "But not when that brother of yours is slacking off. Speaking of which, Kise, who told you that you could take a break from braiding to tell stories?"

"Oh, sorry, captain.”

“And I’m not your captain anymore!”

From there, the group fell into a pattern in which little Kana regaled them with confused and poorly articulated tales at a rapidfire pace, Kise listened to her in rapt attention, and Kasamatsu checked his watch about every thirty seconds while mentally calculating the absolute shortest route to Moriyama's house. He liked Kise's little sister well enough, in spite of (he refused to believe it was _because_ of) her uncanny resemblance to her brother, but the fact remained that they were running out of time.

Eventually Kise snapped the last rubber band into Kana's hair, having swept it into a style that would have made Cersei Lannister hide her face in shame, and managed to fight his way out the door. He couldn't escape giving his sister a big hug before leaving, though.

"You'll come back before my bedtime, right? To say goodnight?" she asked, clinging tightly to Kise's back as he laughingly tried to shake her off. 

"I don't know. Since it's the summertime, my friends and I might stay up late.”

"You should call me, then," the little girl persisted. "On the telephone. And say goodnight."

“Alright, that's what I'll do.”

Kana smiled up at Kise, and Kise smiled back down at Kana. Their smiles were tender, radiant, and, most pertinently, keeping Kasamatsu away from the first game of basketball he had played in weeks.

Kasamatsu decided that their display of sibling-ly affection had gone on long enough. “Time to go,” he grunted, grabbing Kise by the elbow and pulling him towards the door. The blond yelped and wobbled, unsteady on his feet, and the older boy grit his teeth. “Oh come on, stop being such a drama queen and grab your stuff. We’re going to be _late._ ”

“Okay, okay! Give me one second!”

It ended up taking significantly longer than one second for Kise to grab his bag, pick up a water bottle from the fridge, say goodbye to Kana again, and get his shoes on. To be more accurate, all of these actions together took above four minutes. Not that Kasamatsu was timing it or crossing it with his mental calendar of public transportation schedules or anything.

“The next bus’ll be here any minute. We’re going to have to hurry,” Kasamatsu said, eyes fixed on the road ahead of them as they walked through the gate of Kise’s apartment complex.

Not hearing an answer, he looked over at his teammate. But he had already fallen a few meters behind, distracted by some plant or another at the side of the road. Kasamatsu’s first instinct was to yell at him, and he took in a deep breath, preparing to give his wayward kouhai a piece of his mind. But something about the look on Kise’s face right then, that glowing look, a look like nothing in the world could delight him more than that clump of weedy little coneflowers he’d found, made the words stick in his throat. Kasamatsu would have wondered what it felt like to be on the receiving end of that look, if he hadn’t known that such a thing were impossible.

It was tough to look away from him, but eventually Kasamatsu managed. "Let's go," he muttered. And as he turned back around and headed for the gate again, he heard Kise sigh and trail along behind him.

\--

 

They had almost reached the bus stop when Kasamatsu once again noticed a Kise-shaped hole by his side. This time, when he looked back, he found his friend examining a poster taped to a bakery storefront. There was a look of childish excitement in his eyes which Kasamatsu just _knew_ couldn't mean anything good. 

"Take a look at this, captain!" Kise's voice was about two notches cheerier than normal. Kasamatsu didn’t know whether to be frustrated or endeared. "Fun on a Bun's got some new flavors for the summer! They call it their ‘tropical promotion’, I had forgotten about it until just now, but they do it every year. They've got coconut bread, and a mango creamy thing, and..."

"Hold on. Is that the bus over there? Shit, Kise, we really need to-"

"Another one'll come soon. Come on, this is my favorite bakery, and I have been _dreaming_ about these coconut breads since last year. I'll get you one too, how about that?"

"I'll pass." 

Despite his protests, thirty seconds in the future saw Kasamatsu standing in the inside of the bakery, watching Kise salivate over their extensive display case. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the bus pass the window. He would have sighed if he thought that could have any effect on the situation. Maybe he would just go ahead and sigh anyway, because it was starting to become clear at this point that _nothing_ he did could have an effect on the-

"Oh my goodness, can it really be Hayashida-san?" 

"Kise-kun!" A sprightly middle-aged woman had appeared from the other side of the counter, carrying a trayful of loaves from the oven to the shelves. She set down her burden and gave Kise a warm smile. "It's so good to see you. How are your studies?"

"Haha, they're going, they're going." Kise stood up from his crouched position in front of the display case, rubbing at the back of his neck. "School let out a few weeks ago. I should probably get started on my summer assignments, but it's been too nice outside, sometimes it's hard to concentrate."

The woman laughed. “Oh, of course, you don't have to explain yourself to me. My kids have _said_ that they've started their summer work, but I'm sure they won't make a big dent in it until, hmm, maybe the weekend before school starts, if I'm lucky?"

"Right, and how are your kids? Your daughter's starting middle school this year, right? I bet she must be excited~"

The pair of them continued to chat, and gossip, and laugh, and it was like deja vu all over again to Kasamatsu. Hadn’t Kise gotten all of this out of his system, back home when he’d been goofing around with Kana? The older boy looked down at his watch and had to fight a grimace. At this rate, they would miss the second bus too. 

Eventually, Kise got around to placing his order (“how about a coconut bun, please, and maybe some extra sugar on top?"). Hayashida cheerfully packaged it up for him. "So, I take it you're off to play basketball?" she said, continuing to make conversation as she rung him up. 

"Yup! A bunch of my teammates from Kaijou are getting together. This is our captain, by the way, Kasamatsu Yukio." Kise slung an arm over his shoulder. 

Hayashida smiled and nodded. "Ah,  Kasamatsu-kun! I think Kise-kun has mentioned you a time or two. It's nice to meet in person."

"It's a pleasure to meet you too," Kasamatsu replied, unfailingly polite even when all he wanted to do was to grab Kise by the scruff of the neck and drag him off Moriyama's-mancave-ward. 

"Well, it's been nice talking to you, Hayashida-san! We've got a bus to catch, so the two of us will be going now. I'll see you soon though- I wouldn't miss your tropical promotion for anything!"

The pair said their last goodbyes and headed out the door. The second bus had just pulled up to the stop by the time they reached it- quickly, they hopped on and started to head across town. 

Kise smiled at Kasamatsu as they slid into a seat near the middle. "See? We'll make it. There's still plenty of time."

"That's no excuse! Jeez, I can't believe we just wasted fifteen minutes in a _bakery_ when we could have been off playing basketball already."

"We'll get to play basketball soon enough."

"Yeah, but we'll be _late_. This bus only goes so far west, you know, we're going to need to walk for a while again once we get off."

Kise's smile remained firmly fixed on his face, as usual. But he did turn his head to look out the window, away from Kasamatsu. That was probably a bad sign. "I'm sorry. It's just, I haven't been to that bakery in a long time. I missed it."

The temptation was there to keep yelling at Kise for wasting time, to needle at him until he could admit, for once, that he was wrong and Kasamatsu was right. And maybe a few months ago, during basketball season, Kasamatsu would have done just that. But in his current brain-damaged state, all that could think about was how maybe he shouldn’t have brought it up in the first place and how much he wanted Kise to look his way again. 

Of course, it was impossible to vocalize any of this. So Kasamatsu just sighed. "Just eat your bread, if you missed it so much. It does look pretty good."

Kise perked up. "Do you want some?"

"No matter how many times you ask, the answer's still going to be 'no'!"

"Woah, so angry~"

\--

 

It wasn't long before they reached their stop (summertime traffic- or lack thereof- was truly a thing of beauty). Kise had been nibbling at his bun intermittently throughout the ride, but he still hadn't managed to make it through more than a third of it by the time they descended. When Kasamatsu brought this up, Kise just laughed. 

"Nothing's wrong with eating food slowly, especially when you're walking around. It's good for the digestion or something."

Kasamatsu rolled his eyes. "Huh, is that another one of those things you learned in model school?"

"I keep telling you, there's no such _thing_ as model school! Everything you see here is just raw talent. Well, in this case both raw talent and experience. I remember once, during a shoot for some commercial, I was trying to snack on the complimentary deli platter while walking around and getting dressed, but I ended up getting the hiccups _so. bad._ They had to stop shooting for like half an hour while I got it under control. It was ridiculous; whenever I see that director, we still laugh about it..."

Kasamatsu pretended to tune Kise out as usual, looking straight ahead at the street in front of him, but he wasn't able to stop himself from cutting in after what Kise said next. 

"So yeah, I usually eat slow. But I guess I'm eating even slower today, because- and this is kinda a secret- the tropical promotion wasn't really the reason why I had to go to the bakery. It was just that I saw Hayashida-san through the window, and remembered how long it had been since I'd seen her and then I got sad. I really wasn’t hungry at all."

Kasamatsu slowed to a stop while he spoke. Then, he took a deep breath, throwing an imploring glance at the sky. "Are you serious, Kise? We wasted all that time getting bread... when you didn't even want bread? Who the heck is this Hayashida-san anyway, is she like a friend of your parents or-"

"No, I just know her from the bakery. But she's really nice, so I wanted to say hi."

Kasamatsu was still trying to figure out a way to respond to this when Kise pulled ahead of him, hurrying towards a wrought-iron gate to their left. "Oh, I forgot that we were walking by this park! Come on, Captain, there's a pond there and everything. We can use this bread to feed the ducks. Problem solved!”

"Kise, what part of _we are already running late_ don't you understand?" Kasamatsu said through clenched teeth. "Moriyama and Kobori-"

"They'll be just as annoyed if we're fifteen minutes late as they would be if it were five minutes. Come on, Captain. I thought you liked animals and stuff!"

"Have I _ever_ told you that I liked animals?" Kasamatsu grumbled. He started following Kise towards the gate, probably just so that the blond could hear him well enough to argue with him. "Like seriously, have you ever _once_ seen me near an animal and looking like I was having fun?"

"Well, no, but there's a first time for everything!"

It was a summer Sunday, and the park was predictably crowded. Somehow however, Kise managed to snag a bench right by the side of the water, where a couple of ducks were floating peacefully. 

"Hey, over here! Little ducks! I've got some coconut bread for you~"

Kise pinched some bread off of the bun and tossed it into the shallows. The ducks regarded it with suspicion for a moment before one of them, a woody brown female, drifted closer. "Ooh, she's going to eat it!"

"You know, you could have just wrapped the bread up and saved it for later, when an actual person could have had it. Rather than, you know, an animal. A _bird_.”

"But it would have gotten stale!"

"Not right away it wouldn't have.”

Kise tossed away another chunk. This time, the second duck cut in, feathers flurrying as she raced towards the coconut-y morsel. "I keep telling you, captain, if you want some, all you have to do is ask. These ducks are cute, but I'd still rather share my food with a friend."

"For the last time, I do not want any of that bread! I just want you to behave like a reasonable human being for once!" Kasamatsu seethed, and he wondered what it was that was making him so mad. Normally, hearing Kise refer to him as a “friend” would have made him feel so hot and cold and electrically-sparking-out that he would have accepted any amount of tropical bread from him just to make that feeling _stop_. But he was having some weirdly bitter thoughts right then, thoughts about how literally everyone Kise met became his friend right away, like that bakery woman, and the ducks, and Jesus Christ was Kasamatsu really jealous of a bunch of ducks right then? Kasamatsu Yukio, former captain of the nationally renown Kaijou basketball team and one of the most sought-after players of his year? 

Mercifully, Kise was blind to his frustration. ”Mm, I think I'm reasonable enough." He let out a blithe little laugh as he tossed some more crumbs in. Another clump of ducks, sensing the commotion in the water, had started making their way over to them. “Oh look, baby ducklets! They’re so little and fuzzy!”

Kasamatsu frowned. “Don’t be stupid. They’re called ducklings.”

“And you’re still trying to get me to believe that you don’t like animals, even when you’re talking like a zoology textbook.”

“Zoology textbooks have nothing to do with it! This is basic vocabulary that all high school students should know!”

“Whatever you say, captain,” Kise replied, in a voice so completely unruffled that Kasamatsu knew that any further efforts to make him hurry up and leave would be an utter waste of time. And so he just sat on the bench, tapping the thick sole of his basketball sneakers against the concrete as the ducks continued to gather.

A few minutes later, Kise threw in the last chunk of bread, and with a contented sigh he stood up, clapping some residual crumbs off of his palms. “Ah, that was so fun! I haven’t fed ducks since I was a kid, isn’t it really relaxing?”

Kasamatsu couldn’t help but disagree, on the verge of a stress-and-frustration-induced apoplexy as he was. He was past the point of normal stress, and possibly even approaching the point where nothing at all could bring him back down except for a long, hard, game of basketball. But Moriyama’s house was still so far away. 

So in the end, Kasamatsu decided not to respond to the question being posed. Instead, he grumbled out another “let’s get going,” for what felt like the hundredth time that day, and made his way back to the road.

\--

 

Kasamatsu was a realist. He had no expectation that simply getting back on the road to Moriyama’s house meant that the two of them were home free now, or that no more distractions would present themselves and pull Kise’s attention away once again. However, he _had_ been naive enough to believe that they would at least be able to make it out of the park before losing focus. But once again, Kasamatsu had underestimated his friend. 

This time, the distraction came in the form of a bland-looking teenaged guy that Kasamatsu vaguely recognized from the basketball team at one of the neighboring schools. The guy’s team wasn’t very strong, so Kasamatsu had never paid much attention to its players (how could he have, when he had monsters like Seirin and Touou to contend with?), but that didn’t stop Kise from greeting the boy like an old friend, by name. 

“Hey there Maeda! What’s up? Wow, it’s funny, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in street clothes before; I almost didn’t recognize you…”

Maeda seemed confused about this sudden rush of warmth from a near stranger, but it was impossible not to respond to Kise’s enthusiasm. Gradually as the pair of them started to chat, Kasamatsu perceived the stiffness starting to fade from the boy’s body language, the expression on his face becoming less guarded. He wondered bitterly for a moment how it must feel, to be able to talk to Kise like a normal person off the street could. Without having to hold back smiles and kind words. Without having to pretend to be an authority figure while secretly knowing that it had been a long, long time since _Kise_ had been the one at _his_ mercy.

Something twisted around in Kasamatsu’s gut right then. He took a sip of water, hoping that it was just indigestion or something. The gesture didn't help, but then again, he hadn't really expected it to.

Like a silent, grumpy cloud at the edge of a sunny sky, he stood by Kise's side for a while and waited for the conversation to close. He knew from experience- repeated experience, at this point- that trying to tear Kise away from his newfound BFF would be a futile effort. It was better to just wait it out. Patience wasn't his strong suit, but strategy and pragmatism- that he could handle. 

But even those impulses only went so far. For example, everything was okay at the beginning, when Kise and Maeda were still making cautious small talk about summer plans and basketball shoes. But when the conversation progressed to a register somewhat more personal, with Maeda revealing that he was only at the park today to scope it out as a possible first date location for the girl he was planning to confess to and how butterflies-and-bats nervous he was about the whole affair, Kasamatsu started getting premonitions. These premonitions were soon proven to be 100% valid the moment Kise squealed and swore to help him prepare for the event in any way possible. 

Before Maeda even got a change to respond to the blonde's offer, Kasamatsu grabbed at Kise's elbow, holding him still as he hissed his displeasure in his ear. "You _better_ mean that you're going to help him _tomorrow._ "

Kise bit his lip. "But it's a girl from his cram school. He's going to see her first thing in the morning; he won't have time to practice and stuff if he puts it off until then. If I’m going to go with him, I have to do it _now_."

Maeda had started to look a little uncomfortable again at being excluded from the conversation, and Kise looked uncomfortable that they were making Maeda uncomfortable. He didn't whisper anything more to Kasamatsu after then, but the plea in his eyes was eloquent enough. 

Kasamatsu sighed. Some part of him had known that things were going to end this way, had known ever since the distracting sound of that first text message he'd received that morning. Kise was the fucking _worst_ , there were no two ways around it. He was the worst at keeping promises, and the worst at staying on task, and being left behind by him was the worst that anyone had made him feel. "So, what now then?" he wondered, trying to keep the... the piss-off-ed-ness (he refused to call it “hurt”) out of his voice. 

Kise flashed him an apologetic smile. "You can go on ahead. Tell the others I'll be there in an hour or so."

"As if I'd lie to them like that," Kasamatsu said. "Even if you wanted to come, there's no way that you could make it in an hour. You'd get distracted within five minutes and forget where you're even going."

"I would not!"

"I mean, if it's too much trouble…” Maeda began, voice small, “It's not like you _have_ to hang out with me or anything. I was planning to just get ready for it on my own anyway, so it's not a big deal if-"

Kise frowned. "But didn't you say it would be nice to have some help? Like, a second set of eyes to take a look at the outfit you'd picked and stuff?”

"Well, yeah, it wouldn't hurt, but if you already have plans..."

Kise threw an arm around Maeda's shoulders, in a way that Kasamatsu recognized as being almost identical to how he had treated his little sister earlier that day (although Kana had seemed a lot more appreciative of Kise's physical affections than did this teenage boy). "Maeda. Tomorrow might be the most important day of your life, have you ever thought about that? Up until this point, Katsumi-chan has been nothing more than the cute girl that sits beside you in cram school and distracts you from your studies. But what if she says yes to you tomorrow? Who’s to say that she won’t become, like, the cute wife that stands beside you no matter what and distracts you from everything bad in your life?"

Kise grasped Maeda's arm tighter and looked deep into his eyes, overcome with emotion. Surprisingly, Maeda was gazing right back.

"That was beautiful. Thank you."

"I meant every word of it."

"You should be a poet."

"Do you really think so?"

"Yeah."

The cramp in Kasamatsu's stomach had intensified and radiated all over his body, enough that he was thinking back to high school biology and TV medical dramas and stuff in an attempt to list out every deathly illness that he might have contracted in the past five minutes. He had discarded the possibilities of food poisoning and appendicitis but, unfortunately, found himself unable to disprove cholera. Which led him to further contemplations about whether, if he really _did_ have cholera, Kise would care enough about him to get him to the hospital quickly, without distractions or bakery breaks or

The answer to that was an emphatic _no_ , Kasamatsu thought, his voice even more stern when turned upon himself than he let it be when chastising other people. He and Kise weren’t teammates anymore, had hardly even been friends to begin with, and so Kasamatsu had no responsibility whatsoever to decide where Kise went in his free time. What did it matter to him, whether Kise _ever_ made it to Moriyama’s? What would it matter to _Kise,_ if Kasamatsu turned around right then and left? 

And so Kasamatsu turned around and left.

It felt a little surreal, almost, to walk straight out of the park and down the road without having to stop every few seconds. He passed some more ducklings or ducklets or whatever, and didn’t have to hear a single word about how cute they were. And then, once out on the road, he saw some elementary school-aged kid fall off her bike, and he let his eyes slide right past her. He knew Kise would have stopped to help her up. It wouldn’t have even been a _decision_ to Kise, just an impulse. But since it was clear that the kid wasn’t seriously hurt, Kasamatsu didn’t see the point in intervening. Struggles build character, right?

And maybe that was what was wrong with Kise, Kasamatsu mused, as picked his way through the crowds on the busy sidewalk. Maybe he had been helped up too many times as a kid, and so had come to think that everybody was unselfish enough to just _take care_ of people. To talk to them or comfort them or whatever, even if they didn’t ask for it. Even if they were random strangers. 

The reasonable part of Kasamatsu understood that Kise's ease of connecting with people wasn’t a character flaw at all, that on the contrary it was one of the reasons that Kasamatsu had started feeling... whatever weird way he was feeling for him in the first place. Kasamatsu knew he wasn't always the easiest person to socialize with. He knew that he could be demanding, even harsh sometimes, and outside of his basketball team he had very few people that it would unreservedly call his "friends". And of course Kise was aware of that too. But he still chose to stick around, and to send stupid texts asking stupid things like what he had eaten for breakfast, and to make Kasamatsu feel _special_ even when he knew that, to Kise, he was just one face among many in the sidelines of his life. 

Kasamatsu knew that he should be satisfied with that, with just enjoying Kise's company in the limited way that he could. The blond had a sort of warm energy that he emitted indiscriminately in all directions, and there weren't that many people who had the privilege to stand as close to its source as Kasamatsu did. But because Kasamatsu was demanding, and harsh (most of the time, not just sometimes), that wasn't enough for him. He didn't know what he wanted out of their relationship- certainly, it wasn't as if he _expected_ anything- but just hanging around Kise, looking at him while Kise was always, invariably looking at someone else, definitely wasn’t it. 

And that was why he’d had to leave. It was a self-respect thing, probably.

Even when lost in thought, Kasamatsu’s pace as he cut through the sidewalk crowds remained steady, although maybe a touch slower than before. He was past the point of making it to Moriyama's on time, but it wasn't as if his teammates were going to care anyway. Now that there was no Kise around to nag, his carefully-crafted schedule didn't seem to matter that much. 

It dawned on him that Moriyama and Kobori might want a heads-up that Kise wasn't coming. Maybe there was still time to find someone else to round out their teams. It wasn't impossible to play basketball with three people- they’d done it before; mostly it was just a matter of rotating who sat out while the other two played one on one- but Kasamatsu was sure that Moriyama relished the idea of going head to head against someone as massive as Kobori just about as much as he himself did. So, as he waited to cross the road at an intersection, he sent off a quick text. 

_"I'll be there soon, but Kise isn't coming. Sorry."_

A few seconds later, he heard his phone ping. He was in the middle of the road by that point, and trying his hardest to remember whether his next turn was one block away  or two, so he didn't look at it right away. After he finally got on the right track, a quick glance at his phone revealed more or less the response that he had been expecting.

_"Meh, I guess I'm okay with that. At least Kobori and I have a chance of beating you now that the dream team’s broken up."_

"Not a chance," Kasamatsu muttered. Slowly and fumblingly, he began to type out a response, but another message from Moriyama flashed across the screen before he was able to send it. 

_"I guess we’ll have to invite Hayakawa after all. Sigh."_

At that point, Kasamatsu decided that he had better things to do with his time than converse with people who were dramatic enough to actually wrote out the word “sigh”. He supposed it was better than the elaborate sparkly emoticons that Kise employed so prodigiously whenever he texted Kasamatsu, but still. It was weird in its own way.

The prospect of hanging out with the rest of the team without Kise was also weird. It shouldn’t be- they were the _original_ Kaijou team, after all (at least, the majority of it- their former captain had moved to like Canada or something after graduating high school and hadn’t been heard from since), and the original Kaijou team had been pretty awesome. As far as national rankings went, they’d had an even better season Kasamatsu’s second year than they had his third, probably because the arms race to scout Generation of Miracles members had not yet begun back then and the playing field had been a bit closer to even. Hell, Seirin hadn’t even been on the map that past year. That had been a pretty damn good season. 

But since Kise hadn’t been there, it was hard to think of it that way. 

_Self-respect_ , Kasamatsu reminded himself, as he turned on to Moriyama’s street, but he didn’t really feel like he respected himself more than he had before leaving Kise at the park. Really, he just felt alone, and tingling with dim, probably irrational fears that even Moriyama’s mancave and the combative friendship that he was sure to find there couldn’t do anything to make that feeling go away. 

And since he wasn’t sure how to deal with that, he decided to just revert to his regular standby and get really pissed off. At himself first, and how he had spent yet another whole afternoon caught in Kise’s riptide, pining away over someone too fast-moving and flighty to ever be caught. But then that train of thought had evolved naturally to getting mad at Kise instead. Because really, he wouldn’t be having this fucking problem if Kise could just _focus_ for a second, or a minute, or however long it took to keep the promises that he made. It was _Kise_ that should be having a crisis of self respect right then, not Kasamatsu- if they were back at Kaijou again and he were still Kise's captain, Kasamatsu would be kicking him so hard...

Maybe they had been a better team back when Kasamatsu had still been denying his feelings for him. Back before all of these worries had started cropping up about just being a disposable side character in Kise's life, in the days when he had just blindly assumed that his role as Kise's captain gave him the right to squeeze himself into the forefront. 

Dimly, Kasamatsu realized that he had stopped walking at some point, and that he was now standing still by the intersection next to Moriyama's. He wondered how long he had been hovering there and was unable to come up with an estimate, so he let the issue drop. 

The Moriyama family lived in a single family home a little bit down the way. Looking down the row of small yards sprawled out along the backside of the houses, he could even see a corner of the small converted shed that Moriyama had dubbed his "mancave", peeping out from behind the large and rather unsightly net that Moriyama's mother employed to keep animals out of her vegetable garden. Without  even realizing it, Kasamatsu had arrived at his destination. He checked his watch and was surprised to see that he wasn't even noticeably later than he had said that he'd be. Maybe five or ten minutes, but he knew that Moriyama wasn't counting. 

And then, he was just as surprised to realize that, in the end, despite all of  his efforts to arrive on time, he was still going to be a lot more than ten minutes late. Because right then, he had some captaining to do. 

Kise had said something about taking Maeda to the mall to look at clothes or whatever, so Kasamatsu pointed himself in that direction first. Even though the mall was back downtown, a little bit near the park that they had fed ducks at, and Kasamatsu was therefore forced to retrace his steps from before almost exactly, it felt as if he were walking the route for the first time. Before, Kasamatsu had been too stuck in his head to notice anything around him other than the most basic of landmarks and street names. But now he felt more focused.

He didn't know how he was going to find Kise once he reached the mall, of course. On the rare occasions when the two had made plans to meet at a public place, like a certain fast food restaurant or basketball court, it was usually impossible to miss him. It wasn't as if blonde hair was common over in their neck of the woods, after all. And if that didn't work, Kasamatsu had learned that seeking out the nearest crowd or public disturbance was also a pretty good strategy: nine times out of ten, he would find that his teammate stood right in the middle of it. 

In the end, the latter method was how he found Kise, although it took a good hour or so of searching. The blond wasn't even in the mall anymore, but rather out by a little fountain in the plaza next to it; it was only by chance that Kasamatsu caught sight of him at all, through a window by one of the side entrances. 

The relief he felt upon finally locating his wayward friend lasted no more than a second, however. Because, among the small cluster of people that had gathered around Kise, Kasamatsu could find no trace at all of Maeda. As a matter of fact, he didn't recognize a single person among the group. It was entirely made up of what appeared to be a flock of giggling middle schoolers, if he could just their age by their too-loud clothing and over-the-top makeup. 

Kasamatsu ground his teeth. It was bad enough that Kise had ditched him to help a maybe-kinda friend, but ditching him for _this_? What the hell even _was_ this?

Part of Kasamatsu was tempted to just turn around and walk away again. This event had just confirmed something that Kasamatsu had already learned the hard way numerous times throughout the course of the day- specifically, that Kise was a lost cause, with no understanding of friendship or priorities. But another part of him was resigned to the fact that, if Kasamatsu wasn't around to intervene, Kise was never going to learn these things. And even if it wasn't his place to interfere, Kasamatsu was going to anyway, because he was Kise's fucking _captain_. 

Once again, it probably had something to do with self respect. 

Plastering his most disapproving frown on his face, Kasamatsu strode over to the group. "So. Where'd Maeda go?" He tried his best to turn this simple question into an accusation. 

He must have succeeded, because the second he started talking Kise’s eyes grew noticeably wider, causing the girls burst into a flurry of giggles and whispers. Noticing them noticing him, Kise made a valiant attempt to return his face back to its normal, suave appearance. "Oh, he just left. We walked around here for a while and chatted, and then he bought a new outfit."

One of the girls cut in at that point, mouth whirring at a mile-a-minute pace as she added her contribution to his report. “Kise-kun picked it out for him, actually, and he ended up looking really, really cool! I was so surprised- before he just looked like a plain normal guy, but then it was like Kise-kun completely _transformed_ him. That girl is going to say yes for sure tomorrow, you heard it here first.”

Kasamatsu glanced over at the girl and then back at Kise, raising his eyebrows in an unspoken question.

"Haha, yeah, some of my fans joined up with me along the way. They go to Teiko, you know, my old middle school. Isn’t that neat?”

“It’s almost like we know Kise-kun already,” another girl cut in, a dreamy look in her eyes. “Mariko-chan over there and I even have the same homeroom teacher that he used to. We ask her questions about him, like, every day, and normally she doesn’t answer, but we’ve managed to find out a few things. Like did you know? Apparently Kise-kun is really good at English. I wasn’t surprised when I learned that, though. I’ve already heard that English is an important language in, you know, the _industry.”_  

_The industry_. If Kise had spent any brainpower listening to everything that the girl had said, he might have chuckled at how she referred to Kise’s part-time, only-after-basketball-practice-was-over job. But in reality, his brain had shut off almost as soon as she had started speaking, short-circuiting, perhaps, at the ridiculousness of everything coming out of her mouth. Or maybe he was just too busy thinking of ways to pay Kise back for leaving him to pay attention to anything else.

Kasamatsu shot his friend a mischievous smirk and looked over at the girls, crossing his arms as if he meant business. He knew that Kise had a soft spot for his fans, and always liked to entertain them when they approached him out in public. He shouldn't mind, then, if Kasamatsu gave them a little show. "Don't make me laugh. Do you really think that going to the same middle school as this guy did means that you _know_ him? Try playing basketball with him. I guarantee you, I have learned more about this guy over the past year than you _ever_ wanted to know."

Following this bold statement, the gaggle of girls looked predictably intrigued, whereas Kise looked deliciously panicked. "Ah, hey, it's getting late, I think I should go-"

"No, stay here! I want to hear what your friend has to say!"  One of the girls- the same one that had spoken earlier about being in his homeroom- said. "Because honestly, I don't think that he _does_ know more about Kise-kun than I do. I've been his biggest fan since forever. I've seen all of his photo shoots and interviews, every single one. How much can you know about a person, just by running around and throwing balls at them?"

Kasamatsu raised an eyebrow. "What, is that a challenge?"

The girl flipped her hair. Kasamatsu strained to hide a laugh- it had been a while since he had interacted with girls this age, and he'd be damned if it wasn't kind of _fun_. Sure, age them up a few years and he would be tongue-tied before them, unable to piece together a single coherent sentence. But at this age, they were all sass and no sex appeal, he had to admit that they were a little cute. "So what if it was?"

"Fine with me. As if I'm scared of a bunch of runts like you." Kasamatsu shrugged. "We'll have a trivia contest or whatever you want. And if I win, I get to steal Kise from you guys, does that sound alright? _We_ -" he looked over at Kise, who for once was hovering at the edge of the spectacle, rather than standing in the middle stirring it up- "we've got a game of basketball to play."

While he spoke, a squeal was heard of indeterminate source (possibly it came from all of the girls at once), and a whirlwind of whispers arose. Kasamatsu could make out some of them. Generally they were just enthusiastic, stupid things, like "I want to be in a Kise-kun trivia contest! Why does Yumi-chan get to have all the fun?" and "ah, I am totally recording this on my phone!" and, on several occasions, something along the lines of "thank you, God, I am so happy to be alive!" Focusing on these whispers allowed him to tune the more annoying ones (like, "so, is this Aomine Daiki? The basketball player everyone on the internet says Kise-kun is dating?") out, and gave him focus as he looked deep into his competitor's eyes. 

"So," he began. “I bet you don’t know what the name of Kise’s favorite bakery is."

\--

 

After a long and hard struggle (how the heck was he supposed to know what Kise's blood type was? Did he look like a goddamned phlebotomist or something?) Kise, who had been appointed referee, finally declared Kasamatsu the victor. He wasn't sure whether it was because Kasamatsu was truly more knowledgeable about his life or if it had more to do with the blond just wanting to escape, but either way, he didn't question it. It was mid-afternoon, and Moriyama's house was still miles away. If it weren't for the extended daylight of summer, Kasamatsu might even have feared that they had missed their opportunity to play basketball altogether.

As it was, though, he had gotten a text that Moriyama and Kobori had recruited not only Hayakawa, but also a few other guys from around the neighborhood, and so Kasamatsu felt satisfied that the game would go on for many hours to come. Confident in this knowledge, the pair of them struck a leisurely pace towards Moriyama's street. 

To Kasamatsu's relief, Kise didn't inquire about why Kasamatsu had come back for him. Because even after all of that thinking and stressing and denying that he had done, Kasamatsu wasn't sure that he would have an answer for him. Maybe his reason was just as simple as wanting to be by Kise's side. Wanting to care about someone, even one single person, as much as Kise cared about everyone. But that wasn't the whole reason, and even if it were, Kasamatsu wouldn't have owned up to it.

But at the end of the day, Kise was still Kise, and so he couldn’t stay silent for long. So, after a few minutes on the road:

“Thanks for coming back, captain,” he said, and then let out a quick little laugh. “I know it sounds kind of lame, but I really don’t think I would never have gotten free of them without you.”

Kasamatsu frowned. “But I thought you liked your fans.”

“Oh, I do!” Kise responded. Kasamatsu could never understand the way that he got sincerity to _drip_ from his voice like that. He supposed he had learned it in the industry. (It was hard not to laugh after that thought.) “I love every one of them. Especially those girls, they were super cute! But sometimes it can get a little much, that’s all.”

Kasamatsu took a few minutes to process that statement, in the meantime letting the pair of them fall into a second comfortable silence. He supposed that, even though he had been thinking about pretty much nothing but Kise all afternoon, he still hadn’t thought enough. Because it had never even crossed his mind that Kise himself might be frustrated too. That he might think about his own personality, and know that it was the best thing about him (even more than his looks or his charm his English or his Perfect Copy), but want to change it anyway sometimes. 

And that knowledge, well, the knowledge stirred something in Kasamatsu. Maybe it was a protective instinct. Or some kind of captain-al duty. Maybe it was even just- (okay, alright, he would say it-) _love_ or something like that. But whatever it was, it made him feel closer to Kise than he had in a long, long while. Kise cared pretty much equally, maximally for everyone he met, that was true. But it wasn’t that often that he would show a weakness of his own, or allow someone to take care of him in return.

Kasamatsu didn’t feel like he was particularly well-equipped for such a responsibility. But he accepted it anyway. Because he was finally starting to think that even though he could be demanding, and harsh, and about as different from the blond as night was from day, that maybe despite all that he was just what Kise needed.

He wanted to put an arm around Kise right then, but he didn’t. He wanted to say something reassuring and nice, but he couldn’t find the words. So in the end, he just kept walking by Kise’s side, letting their sports bags collide every few paces, and said the kinds of things he always did. “Well, I guess I can understand that. But If you’ve tired yourself out too much to play a decent game against Moriyama and Kobori, I’ll kick you to the next prefecture. That’s a promise.”

It was an utterly normal statement, neither comforting nor romantic. But it made Kise smile anyhow, and stand a little closer to him. And even though Kasamatsu still wasn’t sure what he wanted out of their relationship, he figured that, for the moment, he was content with that. 

**Author's Note:**

> Don't say I didn't warn you about the whole absence-of-anything-resembling-a-plot thing x.x All the same, I had a lot of fun writing this. I feel like Kasamatsu is one of those characters that people interpret in lots of different ways, so I thought it would be interesting to take a crack at it.


End file.
